English authorities receive just 40% of the budget they need to spend on local roads.
Welsh authorities fare even worse, receiving only 28% of the budget they require – just £1 per metre a year is spent on roads in Wales in comparison to £2 in the rest of England and six in London.

Walking the streets of Munich at 23:45 on December 31st 2006 was a refreshing experience. Minimal police presence (by UK standards), crowds of people walking around clutching commercial size (UK illegal) fireworks in one hand, matches in the other. I must admit that they can be a little odd but the Deutschlanders sure know how to live it up ‘Mr Invincible’ style.

Standing on the balcony of D’s apartment, 4 floors up overlooking the street, I tried to count how many H&S infringements were taking place at one time in the street below.

Small firecrackers were being lobbed into the street as cars drove by, whilst the braver of the Barbarian Bavarians held the commercial fireworks in their hands as they set them off. Much beer was consumed which left plenty of spare bottles for the non-immortals to balance their rockets in. Occasionally the odd bottle would tip over and the rocket headed into the crowd of hammered Bavarians, funnily, it didn’t seem to upset the dogs that were present.

Rockets shot past the balcony, one even passing by my feet, exploding just meters away from the balcony. Quite an awesome sight to be staring straight across at exploding fireworks, as opposed to ground level.

As the night wore on me and D retired to watch CNN with a bottle of Erdinger each.

I really am fed up with the kind bull that Sir Ian Blair spews. The latest article by the BBC says it all:

“Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair claims the UK is facing an unparalleled and growing threat of a terrorist attack.

However, he said there was “no specific intelligence” about an imminent attack but the threat was “ever present”.” – BBC News (cont.)

Is it just me that questions the logic of that statement? There is “no specific intelligence” but the threat is “ever present”. Does this sound a little Orwellian to you? It should. Either there must be specific intelligence, or there is no threat, you can’t just say that it’s ever present. It’s like saying there is a threat of a meteor crashing into earth- there are small bits of meteors crashing all the time. As for a large one, yes it could happen, but we don’t go around warning each other everyday or living under the cloud of the threat.

“Sir Ian also said he was “confident” of being cleared of misconduct over the killing of Jean Charles de Menezes.

And he defended an anti-terror raid in Forest Gate, claiming the shooting of a man during the raid was an accident.” (cont.)

I thought it was only the mafia that referred to killing people as “accidents”. As far as accidents go, I hope I don’t end up a police “accident” as I’m running for the tube one day (yet another reason not to use the tube).

I don’t know about you but I am just not comfortable with that term “accident”. It makes it sound like something less significant. Let’s not forget, a man lost his life here, an innocent man who happened to be of the wrong skin tone.

I’m sure if Mr De Menzes by some miracle had survived 6 shots fired into his forehead at point blank range, he would have a different take on the incident.

The commissioner criticised the length of the inquiry, adding: “It’s difficult to understand how an organisation can take 13 months to investigate what I did or did not say on one particular day.”

I must congratulate the commissioner on a clever and great example of deflecting responsibility. Why else would an organisation take 13 months to investigate what you said? There’s a PR tactic that you may have heard of, it’s call disinformation. The only reason there could be any difficulty in establishing facts is differing accounts. The delay, commissioner, is with you and the Met.

It turns out the execution shooting of Jean Charles De Menezes was a test case for the Met.

“It is not about diminishing the tragedy of Charles de Menezes’ death. We see it as a test case, not only for policing in London but for the police service nationally.” – Commander Moir Stewart

Gosh! Really? So did De Menezes know he was just being volunteered for a test case? What determines if the ‘test’ is successful?

The way I see it for The Met, if this ‘test case’ is successful, they have a license to shoot anyone they like in the head, so long as it is in the name of terror. If unsuccessful, the public at least has the assurity that if they do get murdered killed they can make a Health & Safety claim.

“Are the Met now going to issue us guidelines on how not to look like a terrorist, in order to prevent us coming to a similar fate?”

(Raw text, sorry but no links could be restored)

The killers of Jean Charles De Menezes in Stockwell Tube station last summer will not be prosecuted. Instead, their employers will be prosecuted for a breach of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. Reassuring for the employees of the Metropolitan Police Force I’m sure, not so reassuring for the rest of us.

We’ll never actually know what was going through the minds of the killers of Jean Charles De Menezes as he boarded the tube one morning in July, however what we do know is that they made there decision prima facie. They looked at his clothing, his ethnicity, his actions and determined that it somehow qualified for a potential terrorist and so had to be ‘stopped’ before he potentially blew anyone up.

The fact that there was ‘insufficient evidence’ to prosecute any officer involved in the killing should worry us all. What does insufficient evidence mean? It means that it cannot be proved that the officers who shot De Menezes committed an act of murder or manslaughter. For murder or manslaughter to be proved it would have to be determined beyond reasonable doubt that they did not believe they were killing a terrorist. In other words, they were unable to distinguish a terrorist from an innocent civilian.

“In fact, the evidence supports their claim that they genuinely believed that Mr de Menezes was a suicide bomber and therefore, as we cannot disprove that claim, we cannot prosecute them for murder or any other related offence.” – Stephen O’ Doherty – CPS

Therefore, if a police officer, prima facie, observes your clothing, your ethnicity and your actions and comes to a belief you are a potential terrorist, he can shoot you in the head, on site, then claim that he genuinely believed you were a terrorist. After all, how are you going to disprove someone’s beliefs?

Are the Met now going to issue us guidelines on how not to look like a terrorist, in order to prevent us coming to a similar fate?

“However I have concluded that the operational errors indicate that there had been a breach of the duties owed to non-employees under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, by the Office of Commissioner of Police and I have authorised a prosecution under that act.” – O’Doherty

Considering this ruling, perhaps the family of De Menezes will now have to take a different approach (no win no fee accident compensation) to getting justice.